Netflix’s Polar is a solid story beneath all the blood spatter

Netflix’s Polar is an action movie with a serious protagonist who is being pursued by villains who are the complete opposite. It is truly something to behold.

Legendary music video director Jonas Akerlund (whose credits include: Beyonce, Madonna, Fergie, U2, Lady Gaga… do I really need to say any more?) is back with another feature-length film in Netflix’s Polar. He previously set a Guinness world record for a feature-length film with the most edits (5,000!) with his movie Spun. Watching Polar, he may not have been far behind that record in this film.

The first scene sets the tone of the film. We come in on a beautiful mansion. A middle-aged man is settling into retirement sitting beside a pool with a beautiful woman dramatically stepping out of it in slow motion. Big lettering comes across the screen to introduce these characters. Then we see the other characters. There are assassins setting up all around him, and they’re introduced as well. He says some comedic things before he’s taken out and our colorful team of assassins leaves the scene in a helicopter, joyfully singing a song. The girl who was in the pool was part of their team.

From there we’re introduced to Mads Mikklesen’s character, Duncan, who is an assassin who is preparing for retirement. He’s like a slightly older version of John Wick and is getting his accounts in order to prepare for his career ending. The idea is that the head of the organization he was a part of has been killing his people as they retire to avoid paying their pensions. When you go in with the idea that the villains are not to be taken seriously you can enjoy the ride. The problem for me was that I felt like I was watching two different movies at times.

Uneven tone

As stated above, there were two different movies taking place here. On one hand, you have the Mikklesen and Vanessa Hudgens side. Mikkelsen’s character is a lonely man who moves to the mountains of Montana to live out his final days after retiring as a former assassin. He meets Hudgens and quickly figures out that she lives alone and takes a liking to her. It’s also clear that she’s dealing with some things from her past and he’s drawn to the wounded bird vibe she’s giving off.

His character is a killer, but he comes off as a guy with a good heart who just wants to live out his days. We learn that he’s suffering from PTSD early on as well. This side of the story has a serious tone and it would have been an interesting, albeit familiar, movie without the other side of the coin.

That other side is the villains. The team of assassins sent after Duncan are a diverse and weird group that comes off more as comedic than threatening. They kill a lot of people along the way, but it felt like all of their scenes were loaded with more comedic moments than threatening ones. It was hard for me to take them seriously as a threat. Their boss was even more of a clown in both appearance and in his approach. The movie works just as well, if not better, without this group coming off as clowns and it made it hard for me to get into the movie for at least the first half.

There will be blood

The other aspect of the movie that was overdone for me was the blood. I understand that some people are into bloody movies so this won’t be a problem for everyone. For me, though, there were several times where I had to brace myself for what was guaranteed to be a lot of bloodshed.

Epic fights

Now while I’m not a fan of a lot of blood, I do like a good fight scene or showdown and Polar definitely has those. Once our villains catch up to Duncan, they have a great showdown where we get to see his skills in action. There wasn’t a ton of time for jokes so our villains, who I still didn’t take seriously, had to be serious in this scene which kept in line with the protagonist side of the story.

There are two more great fight scenes after this one including one that is reminiscent of the Daredevil and Punisher hallway fight scenes.

Sequel?

The last 30 to 45 minutes or so went a long way towards saving the movie for me. This is a good thing because the way the movie ends seems to leave room for a sequel. Considering how things left off a sequel would likely (hopefully) follow more of the tone of the more serious side of Polar and that would be a movie I’d be interested in watching. If it’s more of what we got in Polar, I will be less inclined.

Should you watch?

If you’re a fan of wild and over the top action type movies then you’ll love Polar. The characters are outrageous and the action pieces involving Mikkelsen are epic. If that is your type of movie you’ll have a lot of fun with this one. However, if gore, extreme violence, or a hard-to-read tone are going to be off-putting for you. Try Close instead.

Polar is now streaming on Netflix.